You know something has gone wrong when the announcement of a new sporting mascot goes viral. Sadly, this is what happened this week when the Portland Trail Blazers NBA team announced their new mascot, Douglas Fur.

Firstly, it should be pointed out that the name is actually pretty cool and is a good example of play on words. Douglas ‘Fur’ – get it? Secondly, this is where the compliments end, as this mascot has gone down like a led balloon.

As seen, it has an almost menacing look to it, with some pretty creepy eyes, and is generally quite an ugly-looking thing. Whilst we’re at it, I’m not exactly sure what animal(?) Douglas Fur is meant to be – which says all you need to know.

Things haven’t got off to a good start for Fur, who has been lampooned on social media. Here are just a handful of comments which have been said by Portland natives. As you can imagine, they’re less than impressed:

“What happened to Blaze? Blaze was cool. This is…. disturbing.”

“I’m getting Vietnam-style flashbacks to days spent at Charles Entertainment Cheese from childhood”

“What have we done to deserve this? I’m going to miss Blaze.”

And perhaps the most cutting insult of them all was when one person wrote “Nightmare fuel”. For the record, it turns out that Douglas Fur is meant to look like Bigfoot. Again, this makes sense and it’s not a bad idea. However, the execution seems horribly wrong.